Why we fight - evolution of justification of war
In the beginning, man fought wars over conflicts. Settled farmer people blocked the winter pasture areas of the shepherd people. Farmer and shepherd people expanded and left for the nomads the difficult terrain with almost no water and almost no food, and nomads as a consequence carried out raids occasionaly. (1)
Later, when wars became more common, people fought wars over strategical positions, money and resources, all of which were important to strengthen the own military and use it for defense against attacks from enemies, should they attack because they wanted pastures for their sheep, better farming lands after their own soil had been consumed, as soil often was after a few harvests in those days. (2)
And people of the settled cultures begun to get more and more offspring, because only the settlements who were numerous stood a chance at surviving the wars at the dawn of civilization, and so cultures who were more warlike and gave birth to more children tended to be most effective at surviving in this new world order. (3)
When the offspring of the people of the settled cultures increased, so did the need for land. And wars followed. More pastures and more farming lands were needed. And as wars became more common, so did the need for strategic positions. Soon men fought wars over tools they could use if they would get into a conflict, instead of fighting the actual conflicts. (4)
And cultures who wished to live in peace were assimilated. Their people weren't always killed, but forced to adopt the culture of their conquerors. And so the warlike cultures won, while all of the peoples lost. Because when the warlike cultures replaced the peaceful ones, the more numerous the wars got, and the more often were wars fought solely over strategic positions and tools to use in the case of an actual conflict. (5)
Eventually, fighting for strategic positions proved to not be enough. Soon, man found himself preventing an enemy from getting weapons that could later be used for conquering strategic positions, which would later be used to their advantage in the event of a conflict. Man found himself preventing an enemy from giving birth to a large offspring, in case the enemy would later use the offspring to create weapons, that could later be used for conquering strategic positions, which would later be used to their advantage in the event of a conflict. And the conquerors rejoyced. But not even that was enough for man, in his greed. (6)
Soon man found yet another reason to fight wars and carry out massacres. Man went after neutrals who spoke negatively of his regime, because they might raise the morale and change the opinion of other neutrals, so they would create weapons, with which they could take strategic positions for him, which they would later use to their advantage, in the event of a conflict. (7)
Now the big question is - why will we fight in the future?
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Notes:
1. most early wars in all areas around the time what we call civilization (assuming we use the definition that civilization equals people starting to live in more complex settled societies) evolved in the area.
2. anyone who has read military history should be familiar with conflicts over strategic positions. The earliest known examples ought to be from Pharaonic egypt and similar, and have existed throughout the roman era and up to this day, more or less.
3. the overpopulation could be partly connected to war, but note that I'm not implying there is a causality connection between war and the increase of offspring among humans, which begun around the time of the dawn of civilization.
4. expansion for "lebensraum" is not unique to the nazi philosophy, but has existed throughout history, although lebensraum is probably the first time there is an actual term for the concept. The germanic and slavic migrations at the time of the fall of the roman empire is a good example, however in that case it's probable that it was initially the roman expansions that caused the dense population of the area, not exaggerated offsprings like in other regions. A similar form of war is war fought to gain resources such as gold, oil, fishing territory etc.
5. while people are often assimilated it's usually not the people that is destroyed, but their culture. I'm not referring to an evolution of human beings, but an evolution of cultures. Adopting certain cultures has undoubtedly given benefits to some people by making them more successful in war, but even more important is the fact that certain cultures without benefiting the people can have a superior strength and in some way or another replacing earlier cultures in a region. In this case, there seems like cultures who are more prepared for war are favored, even though it doesn't benefit the people having the culture that this culture often gives birth to war even when there are no actual conflicts.
6. we all know of the concentration camps of the colonial era and afterwards. Even in ancient times similar strategies of trying to destroy a people rather than trying to stop the fighting as a means of ending resistance and eliminating an existing or imagined threat have been recorded.
7. stalin and others killing political opponents. But even that existed already in ancient times, for example during Domitian, according to several chronicles who in this case are generally considered truthful. The new so called war on terror is also gradually turing into something similar to this.
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Originally Posted by LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix
Re: Why we fight - evolution of justification of war
. While their children will be taught why it pays not to only have peasants as your defence force. 
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